'There have been times when he’s thought about leaving, and this city would not be the same without him.' -- Andrea Watson, on Dane Rhodes

If this is a mid-life crisis, we should all be so existential.

“I’ve been saying for at least a year, we need a party. We don’t need any more awards,” said New Orleans actor-director Dane Rhodes, staring down 50 in the most joyous way possible. “...Because we’re the arts, there’s a competitive quality to everything. But awards ceremonies are punched out. They drive me nuts. It’s not a ballgame. It’s a community.”

As luck would have it, Rhodes’ 50th falls on Wednesday (March 26), which at the time he and Mid-City Theatre’s Su Gonczy were discussing party options, happened to be the only hole in the calendar during the venue’s Cabaret Month celebration.

So on Wednesday, the performing arts community is being encouraged to show up, and do a little number in what promises to be an intriguing little free-for-all.

“Come around and do something and hopefully if it stretches someone, it’ll be great,” said Rhodes, an award-winning stage actor whose scored a series of bit parts in TV and movies over the past decade. “Don’t come do something that you’re really good at! Come dance! Do something you’ve never done before.”

Rhodes’ freewheeling concept has been given a dash of discipline by the stage managers in his life, which include longtime friend Gonczy and his partner, Andrea Watson. They put out the call and received a ton of fun responses.

For example, Ian Hoch and Chris Kaminstein of New Movement Theater, and others, plan to engage in a little improv, acting our stories that Rhodes will tell about his life. Old friends — including Amy Alvarez, Michael Sullivan and Richard Hutton, Chris Marroy, A.J. Allegra — will sing numbers from past productions or songs chosen on a lark. Tara Brewer will dance to the song, “Hard to Love What You Killed,” from musician Jake LaBotz, whom Rhodes discovered working on the set of 2012’s “Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter.”

At some point the performers will turn the tables on Rhodes, bringing with them passages from a chosen script and demanding he do sight-readings, cold.

For both Rhodes and Watson, the party is a little bit of a labor of love in bringing together members of three vibrant communities: theater, film and improv. Rhodes gave Watson her first stage-managing job on Neil Simon’s “The Last of the Red Hot Lovers” and they’ve been together ever since, even appearing onstage together.

"He’s a man of many, many talents," Watson said. "Entirely too numerous to name. He’s a director, he’s a designer, builder, actor, producer. He can do it all, and he has done it all. There have been times when he’s thought about leaving, and this city would not be the same without him. I don’t think he knows how important he is to this town."

Indeed, Rhodes could quite possibly be the hardest-working actor in New Orleans, thanks in part to the booming Hollywood South industry in Louisiana. Before that explosion, he had established himself as an actor and director of note in New Orleans stages in productions, such as “Chicago” at Le Petit, “The House of Plunder” at Southern Rep, “Purlie” at Le Petit and “The Weir” at the Rising Shiners. His filmography is growing by the year, starting with 2004’s “A Love Song for Bobby Long” and including “Django Unchained,” “Déjà Vu,” “The Campaign” and HBO's "Treme" and “True Detective.”

An appearance in the soon-to-be-released “Smothered” has led to a friendship with director John Schneider, whom he’ll help out on the “Dukes of Hazzard” star’s new production facility in Holden. Rhodes says he plans to take any leftover booze from the Mid-City Theatre party and use it to help make a little work party up on the studio’s property turn into a fun bonfire for friends.

The party itself doesn’t have a set admission charge, just a donation to the Learning Service Center location in Raleigh, N.C., where Rhodes' brother Scott is receiving treatment for traumatic brain injury.

Even when having fun, Rhodes is trying to help out. Clearly, he isn’t sweating middle age.

“I gave up on immortality several years ago,” he said with a laugh. “This is not my red Corvette.”